The effects of Chinese pine (Pinus tabuliformis) on soil variables after afforestation have been established, but microbial community changes still need to be explored. Using high-throughput sequencing technology, we analyzed bacterial and fungal community composition and diversity in soils from three stands of different-aged, designated 12-year-old (PF1), 29-year-old (PF2), and 53-year-old (PF3), on a Chinese pine plantation and from a natural secondary forest (NSF) stand that was almost 80 years old. Abandoned farmland (BL) was also analyzed. Shannon index values of both bacterial and fungal community in PF1 were greater than those in PF2, PF3 and NSF. Proteobacteria had the lowest abundance in BL, and the abundance increased with stand age. The abundance of Actinobacteria was greater in BL and PF1 soils than those in other sites. Among fungal communities, the dominant taxa were Ascomycota in BL and PF1 and Basidiomycota in PF2, PF3 and NSF, which reflected the successional patterns of fungal communities during the development of Chinese pine plantations. Therefore, the diversity and dominant taxa of soil microbial community in stands 12 and 29 years of age appear to have undergone significant changes; afterward, the soil microbial community achieved a relatively stable state. Furthermore, the abundances of the most dominant bacterial and fungal communities correlated significantly with organic C, total N, C:N, available N, and available P, indicating the dependence of these microbes on soil nutrients. Overall, our findings suggest that the large changes in the soil microbial community structure of Chinese pine plantation forests may be attributed to the phyla present (e.g., Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Ascomycota and Basidiomycota) which were affected by soil carbon and nutrients in the Loess Plateau.

S: The histone deacetylases play important roles in the regulation of gene expression and the subsequent control of a number of important biological processes, including those involved in the response to environmental stress. A specific group of histone deacetylase genes, HD2, is present in plants. In Arabidopsis, HD2s include HD2A, HD2B, HD2C and HD2D. Previous research showed that HD2A, HD2B and HD2C are more related in terms of expression and function, but not HD2D. In this report, we studied different aspects of AtHD2D in Arabidopsis with respect to plant response to drought and other abiotic stresses. Bioinformatics analysis indicates that HD2D is distantly related to other HD2 genes. Transient expression in Nicotiana benthamiana and stable expression in Arabidopsis of AtHD2D fused with gfp showed that AtHD2D was expressed in the nucleus. Overexpression of AtHD2D resulted in developmental changes including fewer main roots, more lateral roots, and a higher root:shoot ratio. Seed germination and plant flowering time were delayed in transgenic plants expressing AtHD2D, but these plants exhibited higher degrees of tolerance to abiotic stresses, including drought, salt and cold stresses. Physiological studies indicated that the malondialdehyde (MDA) content was high in wild-type plants but in plants overexpressing HD2D the MDA level increased slowly in response to stress conditions of drought, cold, and salt stress. Furthermore, electrolyte leakage in leaf cells of wild type plants increased but remained stable in transgenic plants. Our results indicate that AtHD2D is unique among HD2 genes and it plays a role in plant growth and development regulation and these changes can modulate plant stress responses.

When the leaf area index (LAI) of a forest reaches 3, the problem of spectrum saturation becomes the main limitation to improving the accuracy of the LAI estimate. A sensitivity analysis of the Grey Level Co-occurrence Matrix (GLCM) parameters which can be applied to satellite image processing and analysis showed that the most important parameters included orientation, displacement and moving window size. We calculated the values of Angular Second Moment (ASM), Entropy (ENT), Correlation (COR), Contrast (CON), Dissimilarity (DIS) and Homogeneity (HOM) from Quickbird panchromatic imagery using a GLCM method. Four orientations, seven displacements and seven window sizes were considered. An orientation of 90° was best for estimating the LAI of black locust forest, regardless of moving window size, displacement and texture parameters. Displacements of 3 pixels appeared to be best. The orientation and window size had only a little influence on these settings. The highest adjusted r² values were obtained using a 3 × 3 moving window size for ASM and ENT. The tendency of CON, COR, DIS and HOM to vary with window size was significantly affected by orientation. This study can help with parameter selection when texture features from high resolution imagery are used to estimate broad-leaved forest structure information.

Soil salinity is a major abiotic stressor affecting plant growth. Salinity affects nitrification and ammonification in the soil, however, limited information is available on the influence of different N sources on N metabolism during salt stress. To understand the N metabolism changes in response to different N sources during moderate salt stress, we investigated N uptake, assimilation and the transcript abundance of associated genes in Populus simonii seedlings treated with moderate salt stress (75mM NaCl) under hydroponic culture conditions with nitrate (NO₃^-) or ammonium (NH₄⁺). Salt stress negatively affected plant growth in both NH₄⁺-fed and NO₃^--fed plants. Both NH₄⁺ uptake and the total N concentration were significantly increased in the roots of the NH₄⁺-fed plants during salt stress. However, the NO₃^- uptake and nitrate reductase (NR) and nitrite reductase (NiR) activity primarily depended on the NO₃^- supply and was not influenced by salt stress. Salt stress decreased glutamine synthetase (GS) and glutamate synthase (GOGAT) activity in the roots and leaves. Most genes associated with NO₃^-uptake, reduction and N metabolism were down-regulated or remained unchanged; while two NH₄⁺ transporter genes closely associated with NH₄⁺ uptake (AMT1;2 and AMT1;6) were up-regulated in response to salt stress in the NH₄⁺-fed plants. The accumulation of different amino acid compounds was observed in the NH₄⁺- and NO₃^-- fed plants during salt treatment. The results suggested that N metabolism in P. simonii plants exposed to salt enhanced salt resistance in the plants that were fed with NO₃^- instead of NH₄⁺ as the sole N source.